Tales of Dodgy Birthday Cakes - 2011 Edition

Well, as the tales of Dodgy Birthday Cakes go, this year was probably one of the better creations to come out of my kitchen.  Thanks to the inspiration provided, unknowingly, by the lovely Fiona and Kathy, I had a plan that was sure to be reasonably successful.  Stressful yes, as a hot day in semi tropical north Queensland is not the best time to be icing with butter icing and chocolate finger biscuits, but one learns to work swiftly in trying conditions.

Shall I present, Miss EIGHT's (well, in actual fact she is eight tomorrow, but we had cake today at school) birthday cake:

And let the record state how cunningly this photo was taken so as to not capture the absolute disaster zone that was my kitchen bench, indeed whole flat surface of kitchen, after this event.  Who knew I could spread so much crap so far, when really so little in the way of kitchen implements was required. (my husband will probably tell you that indeed, he knows very, very well of my ability to accomplish this task!) But cunning photographer I am!

I ended up chopping the fingers in half (roughly, as you can tell!), due to the large size of the cake.  A smaller, taller cake would have looked great with the full sized finger biscuit.  As it is now, we have three and a bit packets of these biscuits left over (sigh) as obviously I could not estimate how many I needed. And I did intend to cover the WHOLE cake with freckles, but felt sorry for the teachers to have to teach the kids with that much sugar on board.

as a side note here, oldest child has just dropped and broken ceramic paint-it-yourself piggy bank given as a gift from her teacher, after being told no less than five times to go and put the thing down and let it dry, which she ignored and kept carting in to "show me".   She is now sobbing, but one way to learn a lesson in 1. listening to mother's advice and 2. things break when you don't take due care.  (can you tell the sympathy levels are not high?!) lesson in life.

Anyhow, the cake was a success, consumed a good few hours before the dropped piggy bank debacle that has just occurredI think this photo conveys 1. she liked it and 2. the goofy stage she is going through! .

Enough cake remains for Dad to have a bit tonight when he gets home; tomorrow the true birthday will be celebrated with gifts and a swim and smoko at the creek down the road.

Thanks friends, for your advice last post, re other little gifts for the girl's birthday. Mission accomplished!